Page 61 of The Lies Between Lovers

“It was a chuckle. At most.” Then, Vas cocked a brow. “What were you thinking?”

“I told you—”

“Who is in a killing mood tonight?”

Igor simply blinked at the reflection of the two men staring back at him from the mirrored wall of the elevator. “That’s not even funny.”

“I thought it was.”

“You have jokes now, too?”

Vaslav shrugged—and desperately wished his good mood wasn’t so obvious that even Igor could tell there was a noticeable difference. “Maybe I just shouldn’t have shaved the other day. Then you couldn’t see when I smiled.”

“I wouldn’t call that a smile, no?”

“Eat shit.”

The deadpan retort, that wasn’t even very hot, had Igor cackling out a laugh, too. Maybe it was because the tension had eased, but he felt more inclined to share. “I was thinking ... you know, Vas, I can’t honestly say there has been a time in my life when I’ve been able to keep one woman trapped behind the same four walls with me for longer than a day. You’ve managed two.”

“Going on three,” he murmured.

Although, more to himself. Vera’s stay at the home would soon be coming to an end, however, for a couple of reasons. Her phone never stopped buzzing once he brought all of her bags up to her, but she was happy to shove it away. She reminded him as well that she had work to get back to—about that, he opted not to correct her when it was still Feliks’ job—and things to handle for Mr. Anatoly.

And at the same time, was happy not to leave his bed. She didn’t complain when food was brought to the door. Especially not after he got the flat screen connected to the streaming service she liked on her phone, and he pulled every curtain tight.

Only the very edge of a migraine had been creeping in on him for the last day, but he blamed that on the fact he was forced to wait for other news that he couldn’t control until it was done. He couldn’t remember a time when he was falling asleep before midnight and waking up just after the sun had risen in the sky. Never mind feeling like he had slept.

“And there’s more than four walls in the master suite—there’s an entire three rooms, practically,” Vaslav added after a long pause between the two.

“Not really what I was getting at, boss.”

Yeah, he figured.

Except he wouldn’t go there. That part of Vera’s stay, how he kept her naked and wet; needy, so tender and hungry in a way food wouldn’t fill, was not something Vaslav would ever share.

He needed it to stay in his mind.

One day he might forget.

“And,” Igor muttered as the elevator shuddered its way down the shaft twenty feet, inch by slow inch, “if we’re sharing and being honest without getting a gun to the back of the head—”

“Who brought the gun?” He nodded Igor’s way. “We are going to need that, hmm?”

Igor scoffed. “You’ll just use mine.”

Well ...

“Fair enough,” Vaslav said in a sigh.

“I was starting to think you were scared of the master rooms,” Igor said quietly. “No offense, of course.”

Also, fair.

“Honestly,” Vaslav returned, “because apparently we’re doing that, you and me—I thought I was scared of it, too.”

He could feel the elevator hit the bottom, and in the three seconds it took for the door to begin creeping open, Igor asked, “But?”

“But I felt nothing there.”